On resolutions and writing

About three years ago I started working for the company I still work at. At the time, all incoming customer-facing employees had to attend weekly meetings of Toastmasters. It’s a speech club where people meet informally once a week over lunch and practice their public speaking. I really enjoyed the experience, and I was a bit sad when we abandoned that requirement.

My first speech was the standard ‘introduce who you are are’ talk. I described this backpacking vacation I took after grad school, and how I had planned almost every single day of the three-month trip. I started with the sentence: “I like to plan.” I went on to discuss how I plan so seriously that I track and categorize my New Year’s resolutions in a Google doc.

This year I decided to try something different. Partly inspired by articles like this, I’m trying monthly resolutions. And for February my resolution was to write a blog post every single day. I’ve tried a much more watered down version in the past and failed miserably. So far I’m past the half-way point and still on target. Granted, I’ve had a few posts that simply quoted others. And there is at least one more Jamaican food post left to help me fill out the month. But I’m happy with what I’ve accomplished.

I figure at some point I’ll want to get serious about finally completing that book idea I have. And from reading other writers, consistency matters more than anything else. So while this torrid pace almost certainly won’t continue for the rest of the year, I hope it set me up to get used to writing consistently–something I’ve been unable to achieve until now.